Judging a Recipe by Its Magazine Photo is Like Judging a Book by Its Cover

A month or so ago I saw a recipe for a delicious looking "tart" in a Martha Stewart magazine.

The recipe looked complicated (to me) and included lots of unhealthy ingredients like sugar, whipping cream, chocolate, and peanut butter... and even an ingredient I had never tried before - creme fraiche ("Crème fraiche is a delicious, thinner form of sour cream first developed by the French. It has a slight hold and tanginess because it contains bacterial cultures. But the amounts of cultures are minimal as compared to those in sour cream. Crème fraiche can be used as a topping, in sauces, or in a variety of other applications, and many prefer it to the standard and more commonly available sour cream because of its creamy texture.")

But it looked absolutely wonderful! I can't pass up a combination of caramel and chocolate. It reminded me of a ramped up version of Peanut Butter Pie (a family favorite).

I put away the magazine but came across it again last week. And this time I decided that I was going to try and make it.

I easily found the creme fraiche at Trader Joe's but could not find the chocolate wafers - so I ended up using a pre-made Oreo-crust pie pan. Other than that I pretty much followed the recipe - even using heavy cream for the mousse and full-fat cream cheese (usually on the Peanut Butter Pie I use fat-free Cool Whip and reduced fat cream cheese).

This afternoon the girl and I put together Martha's Peanut, Caramel and Chocolate Tart. It was pretty simple - but I don't really like recipes with multiple steps.

Now the tart (I'd call it a pie) is still in the fridge cooling - but of course I had to have a taste and you know what? I don't really care for it :( I tend to think something is going to be wonderful when the name Martha Stewart is attached to it...but I think next time I'll just stick to Aunt Jackie's Peanut Butter Pie.

Sometimes simpler is better.

Now if I was to try this recipe again, these are the changes I would make:

- I'd use Aldi caramel sauce rather than make it - I did not like the sourness that the creme fraiche added (and either add zero peanuts or break the peanuts into small bits)
-I'd use my traditional Peanut Butter Pie filling for the mousse
-I'd use milk chocolate in the chocolate ganache rather than semi-sweet

I guess I'll have to see if the rest of the family likes it or not...

A Cautionary Tale - Why You Should Never Stick Your Hand in a Hole

This afternoon the weather was too beautiful to stay indoors, so after lunch I took the kids out to the park.

This is a park that has a large lake that the kids enjoy wading in and trails we enjoy walking on.

We crossed a bridge and walked along the sandy beach trying to catch frogs - well the girl was. On the way back over the bridge we headed on down to the water under the bridge. There is a trail through the woods next to the water and as we were passing we heard a funny noise.

The girl thought it was a frog but to me it sounded like the cry of a kitten. She could hear the sound coming from the edge of the water under some tangled vines under the turf that was overhanging the water (if that makes sense). She looked under the vines into a hole and saw a frog.

"It's a huge bullfrog!" "I think he is stuck." She put her hand in and tried to gently coax him out of the hole but couldn't see too well and she was worried she might hurt him.

"Are you sure it's a frog?" I said, feeling a bit wary. "Yes it's a frog!" she relied rather exasperatedly (b/c of course she knows what a frog looks like). The boy agreed as he also got a glimpse of it.

The girl used an empty plastic cup to try and scoop him out of the hole with. After awhile with no success, and wanting to continue our walk, I said "Just use your hands." But as I said she didn't want to hurt him and since his leg was stuck on a branch or something she didn't want to pull and end up with part of a frog in her hand.

After a little more tugging there was a quick motion, a scream and I thought I saw the frog fall into the water. I figured she was a bit grossed out by the GIANTNESS of the bullfrog.

But it wasn't so.

She screamed because, yes there was a frog. And yes he was stuck. Stuck in the MOUTH of a snake!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

She had been gently tugging when all of a sudden she, and the boy, saw the snake with his mouth on the frog's leg. And not just a itsy bitsy snake but a very large snake. I saw something too - just not sure if what I saw was the snake or the frog as it was so quick.

We're not too sure how much of what she was feeling in there was the frog and how much was the snake! How creepy is that??!

All three of us left that area rather quickly. I felt terrible that I had been encouraging the girl to just reach in and grab the frog. Everyone knows you should never stick your hand into a hole you can't see into!!!!!!!

As we were walking away the boy said, "It was the Providence of God that that snake had its mouth full of the frog." (meaning the snake couldn't bite the girl with his mouth already full).

At first the girl said the snake was a water moccasin, then she said maybe a copperhead. I'd say that due to it's location it was probably a water moccasin - but she said it wasn't black - so who knows!

What also totally creeps me out is thinking of that odd sound the frog was making - making b/c it was being eaten by a snake....aaahhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Chicago Museums on the Cheap

Husband, kids and Sue

Yes I know I haven't written much lately and this trip happened a few weeks ago - but that doesn't mean that I haven't thought about writing a number of times.

We've wanted to visit Chicago with the kids, for a long time. A couple of things hindering such a trip was that we wanted to wait until the kids were old enough to really enjoy things and that they would be up to all of the walking. A lot of walking. Also the cost. Did we really want to spend upwards of $500 to see some museums? Then we heard about the museum free days.

A number of museums in Chicago are required to have 52 "Free Days" per year (you can check their websites to see which days - usually they are in the off season) - so we scheduled our trip around the free days. The free days are NOT just for Chicago residents as some might think.

We drove up Sunday afternoon and came home late Tuesday night.

In that short span of time we were able to visit: Frank Lloyd Wright's studio/house (outside only) and neighborhood, The Shedd Aquarium, The Field History Museum and the Museum of Science and Industry and Ikea.

We had a great time. Except for the traffic. And our sore feet/legs.

Our first stop was early Sunday evening when we stopped at Oak Park to visit the area where Frank Lloyd Wright (FLW) lived and worked.

FLW designed house

Since the FLW studio was closed when we got there - we just walked around the buildings, peered in the windows and walked down the street which contained a number of cool houses and a church that Frank designed. Any of those houses on the street, even the non-FLW houses - I'd be happy to live in.

We only had about an hour of daylight left when we arrived in Oak Park, so our tour was unfortunately brief.

We stayed at a Motel 6 about 20 minutes from downdown (well 20 minutes if say you were flying - but about 90 minutes if you were driving during rush hour, as we were).

Kids and sea creature

Monday morning our first stop was the Shedd Aquarium. It was incredible to see all the beautiful and unusual fish and other aquatic creatures…we saw some beluga whales – fun to watch them being trained. The girl loved the aquarium especially and was often heard saying “Oh” and then “it’s a ___”. She’s pretty good at identifying creatures she likes – and was happy to be able to see things up close – she has wanted to go to an aquarium for a number of years and her dream was finally fulfilled. When we left around noon there was a huge line of people waiting to get in to the aquarium. The line was in fact, all the way outside (canopies are set up to protect folks from the elements while they wait for ??? maybe an hour or two). I think they let people in rather slowly as space indoors is limited and you don't want to have to try to climb on the shoulders of the 50 people in front of you to see the seahorses or paddlemouth fish. So my advice - GET THERE EARLY. Make sure you take into consideration that it might take you a whole lot longer than you think - to drive the short distance to the aquarium.

In the afternoon we visited the Field History Museum where the dinosaurs were a favorite – especially “Sue”. We also enjoyed seeing the large Egypt exhibition.

Since the aquarium and Field Museum are next door to each other - we parked at the nearby football stadium parking garage and so only had to pay once for parking (we stayed all day). Cost - about $17

Lunch was at McDonalds in the Field Museum - McDonalds is usually cheap - but this McDonalds - no doubt due to its convenient location - was a total of about $5 more than usual.

On the shore of Lake Michigan - I could have stayed there a long time enjoying the view.

When we were finished at the Field Museum, we took a picnic lunch and ate it down on the beach of Lake Michigan – the weather was perfect and the kids (and I) enjoyed taking off our shoes and socks and walking along the beach (a good therapeutic massage for our very sore feet). Later we walked to Buckingham Fountain and then to downtown Millenium Park and the Crown Fountain and the giant steel “bean” Cloud Gate. We were very weary by the time we got back to our car that we left parked at the museums. Tylenol was dispersed.

The "Bean"

Our Tuesday morning drive downtown was less stressful as we now knew what to expect and we arrived at the Museum of Science and Industry before it even opened. We spent the day there – just leaving for a picnic lunch on the grounds. The kids went on a tour of the enormous German submarine that was captured during WWII and is in the basement of the museum. The girl and I especially enjoyed watching the chicks hatch in the incubator. Note about parking - here is a metered parking area in front of the building that says Space Center (or some such thing) that is to the left of the entrance of the Museum of Science and Industry and parking was cheaper than parking in the underground parking garage mentioned on their website ($7 vs $16).

Periscoping

We left for home around 3:30- though we stopped in at an Ikea store just outside of Chicago and shopped around for about an hour and then had supper there. Fun. BUT can someone please tell me why, the one item that I wanted from Ikea, that I have wanted for over two years, has not been in stock the only two times I have ever visited Ikea (this one plus the one in Minneapolis) ??

All in all the trip was a great experience – one that hopefully the children will remember.

In total our trip cost about $250. This includes gas to and from Chicago, two nights at a cheap motel, 2 days of museum parking, entrance to 3 museums (there was an additional charge of about $12 total for both kids to tour the inside of the submarine - but the tour is optional - unless you have a boy that loves all things military and wanted to go inside the sub very badly - then it's not optional but a desperate necessity) and a walking tour of FLW neighborhood, and 4 fast food-ish restaurant meals (we brought breakfast foods to eat in our motel room and had a picnic lunch for two of our other meals).

Though $250 isn't "peanuts" to a lot of folks - this is cheap for all the things we were able to do in Chicago. Admission to the 3 museums alone would have been approx. $250 for our family of four - which would have doubled the cost of our trip.

A Note

This is a note that greeted me when I first stepped into the kitchen this morning.

In case you can't read it: "Thank you 4 making this 4 your loving son! xoxoxo"

It was written by the boy and propped up against a box of pancake mix.

The note was a clever way of asking and his handwriting so nice - that of course I did it.

The Girl is Now Eleven...

We had a little photo session on her birthday - these are a couple of photos she really wanted Grandma S to see :)

And yes that is a real snake...(skin that is)!

The girl would have been mighty excited to meet the snake that fit that skin...

Transformation - Junonia coenia Hubner

A week or so ago, the girl found a caterpillar.

Into the critter catcher (CC) it went.

Very soon a chrysalis formed at the top of the CC.

This morning the girl placed a damp paper towel in the bottom of the CC.

This afternoon she noticed something different...the chrysalis was broken open and standing outside of it was a butterfly.

We took the butterfly outside for a photo and after a few shots (most too blurry to post) she flew away.

Early tomorrow we are leaving for the farm - what a blessing for the butterfly to be "born" while the girl was still here :)

The girl just looked it up and found out that the butterfly is the Junonia coenia Hubner otherwise known at the Common Buckeye.

Grandma R. told the girl that they recently saw a black snake in their garage and an 8-inch walking stick on the front porch. You can imagine the girl is excited at that news!

Gregory the Praying Mantis

I love this photo! Which is the real artwork? Both are unique - both have a Creator/creator.

Gregory is the Praying Mantis the girl found about a week ago. We were just walking along the sidewalk between Hobby Lobby and the fabric store when the girl spotted him on the pavement.

Of course she had to have him. But what to capture him in?? I dumped out my cosmetic case into my purse and she used that. He tried to allude capture by flying across the parking lot into a bush...but the girl was persistent.

Gregory on the girl's arm

We've witnessed Gregory consuming his lunch...not for the faint of heart...live crickets having their heads cut off and their guts consumed...